I just finished the campaign today. I really wasn’t expecting much from the campaign on this one but I have to say I was kind of blown away; this is one of the best FPS single player campaigns I have played in a long time.

Every section felt unique and a couple did things I’ve never seen in a game before. One of which introduced a new mechanic that felt like it could have been expanded into a whole game of its own.

I guess we are disagreeing on the definition of open world at this point with a couple of those titles. Open World as a “genre” has come to mean something a bit different from games that happen to have a play area larger than a corridor. These titles tend to have an emphasis on side quests that exists for the sake of xp or resource grind, item collection and long expanses between “story driven” content. Essentially checklist or achievement based game play. It’s interesting that you included WoW since an MMO embodies a lot of the negatives of the open world gameplay. The saving grace of an MMO being that you get to face it with friends, so the mundane becomes an engaging social experience.

It’s generally just that most open world games have an ocean of content but that content has the depth of a kiddie pool. I would rather have a handful of highly fleshed out and compelling encounters than a bunch of side missions that usually amount to little more than filler or busywork. Ubisoft games are probably the worst offenders here but I would say the majority suffer from it.

I enjoyed Arkham City well enough but it really gained nothing from being open world other than it being a time sink to get from one interesting point to the next. In fact, most meaningful content in that game was located in buildings anyways so loading screens and traditional levels would have worked just fine.

Witcher 3 I will grant you is a bit of an exception to the rule and really did deliver both breadth and depth of content.

Half-baked in this case does refer to the ending. A lot of reviews mention that things start to fall apart more and more the further you get into the game. Basically sounds like it was rushed to launch and could have been something really special with a couple more months of development time.

Everything I’ve read and seen about this game makes me think it would be right up my alley, unfortunately, everything I see also says that it is only half baked right now. I really hope patches or a game of the year edition managed to fix everything.

One thing I was struck by was the lack of anything the rest of the year - well except for the huge one (Pokemon.) I wish there would have been something I could be excited about buying.

Paper Mario: Color Splash is probably the last hurrah for the WiiU this year, at least in terms of first party support. There are a couple indie titles to look forward to if the WiiU is your only console but most of them have multi-platform releases.

Super Mario Maker for Nintendo 3DS, the portable version of the Wii U game let players create and play their own Mario levels in the style of Super Mario Bros., Super Mario Bros. 3, Super Mario World and New Super Mario Bros. Players will be able to share their Mario creations via local wireless and StreetPass, but players won't be able to upload them to the internet for others to play.

The 3DS is a good system, be aware that while rare, there are a couple games that do rely on the 3D gimmick, or are at least better with it on. The main game that comes to mind is Mario 3D land but I know I’ve encountered it in other games as well. In 3D Land a couple levels and quite a few of the bonus stages would be really difficult or even impossible without the 3D effect.

I enjoyed the first Titanfall a lot and I’m not normally the biggest fan of multiplayer shooters. Unfortunately, it was a bit light on content which caused the player base to dry up pretty fast. I’m cautiously optimistic for this one.

Where the hell do you get "fail" from that? I see Sterling's review again, and some Polygon grumbling, but everyone else is cautiously positive.

Currently sitting at a 70% on metacritic, which is generally considered pretty low. For what its worth, I have enjoyed many games in the 70 percentile range but many people consider anything lower than 80 untouchable.

This is what I'm saying.

This will be the first sub-80% game I've bought in years.

Really?? You've missed some great games.

First of all, I don't consider a score in the 70s to be "pretty low." "Pretty low" is 60s and 50s. Especially with a game that's divisive like NMS.

It’s the metacritic effect. Metacritic converts unequal review types to decimal. Four stars is a good game, right? Well that is an 80% on metacritic. Three stars is all the way down to a 60%, or just above failing if you treat that like a school grade. This makes the other two stars pointless if you realize this is how most people are going to see your review. You can track general score inflation of AAA published titles since metacritic became powerful. It’s rare to find an AAA title that receives lower than an 8, even if the review is mostly negative. It’s basically the Futurama joke made real; we’re going to give this game the worst grade imaginable, an A-minus MINUS!

The outliers are people like Jim Sterling who treat a 5 as average like it should be. He doesn’t say it’s a bad game; just that it is very mundane in the survival/ exploration genre.

Where the hell do you get "fail" from that? I see Sterling's review again, and some Polygon grumbling, but everyone else is cautiously positive.

Currently sitting at a 70% on metacritic, which is generally considered pretty low. For what its worth, I have enjoyed many games in the 70 percentile range but many people consider anything lower than 80 untouchable.

MMOs are largely popular because you are doing the repetitive task with other people. You are also rewarded with unique items that you can then “show off” to other people. You take out the player interaction and you are left with a pretty dull experience. I’m sure there are some people who DO enjoy MMOs solo but I would wager they are the outliers instead of the norm.

Of course, if you enjoy the game, all the power to you. Although I am curious, what type of review would you want if not one about the gameplay?

I’ve been watching a few of first impressions videos put out so far and it seems perfectly “alright”. It has some really cool ideas but it doesn’t look like many of them have really been expanded on. It’s like it took the agenda of doing 20 things mediocre instead of 1-2 really well.

Also, for those wondering about the length, some of the early videos have pointed out an option at the start of the game. One is unguided sandbox, do what you want and the other is basically a guided tour to the center. With the second option you can still explore as much as you want but it gives you a semi linear path to “finish” the game.

I had the same impression. When I read he'd rushed to the center, I stopped paying attention.

He specifically said he did not speed run to the center.

Right, but neither did I.

Despite what he may have said later that he still had to do, he made a point of saying he finished the game in 30 hours, which, given the type of game this is, means he rushed to do so.

What percentage of an open world game do you need to have finished to NOT have rushed to the ending? I find that open world games tend to have a ridiculous amount of pointless filler that I would just soon not experience.

The newest rumors speculate that it is actually the newer, currently unreleased version of Tegra, which would make a lot more sense considering there is already a lot of noise about XBone and PS4 ports headed for the system on release.

I backed it day one. Really excited for this since System Shock 2 is one of my all-time favorite games. The only thing that gave me concern is that they stated they are going for a semi-retro aesthetic with the textures. After playing the demo I had assumed they were just placeholder art.

I’m going with a wait and see approach. The last couple Mario RPG’s haven’t done much for me. The last one I really enjoyed was Bowsers Inside Story. If they can capture that sort of feel I will be on board.

I love the game in concept but I ultimately decided it wasn’t for me. They never really fixed match making and the skill ceiling is huge. The result is that unless you were willing to dedicate 50+ hours to “getting good” you can expect most of your matches to be over in seconds after getting shot in the head by someone you didn’t even see.

We played with 5 players both times, maybe player count was part of it? Nate and I wanted the combat to be something else as well. I understand that it isn't the focus of the game, but it felt a little lackluster.

We loved the upgrade mechanic and the popularity loss from attacking other players workers.

We have played most games with five but yeah, the game is about the threat of combat versus outright aggression. You always need enough military might to defend your resources but you probably won’t use it unless you decide to keep all your goods on a single tile. The one exception is the black faction (I don’t remember the name) who can use combat to fast track the game. Since he is not limited in the number of stars he places from combat, he can easily end the game at any time once he has three stars.

In all the games we’ve played, I think the most battles fought in a single game were 5, and usually they are over the factory in the center.

I’m surprised at your “meh” impression of Scythe. My group loves it. The early fight for the Factory, laying out your workers as human shields, using your mobility power to sneak enemy resources is all good fun.

I’m a little confused how someone could have all their stuff out and have not ended the game. Once stars start appearing they show up in mass. The last game we played I managed to get 3 stars out on the same turn, thus ending the game. Also, popularity is the most important resource you can go for. It should feel like a rush to hit the third tier of popularity and then force end the game before your opponents can catch up. That or realize that you are never going to hit the third tier and force an end as soon as you secure some form of advantage.

I'd like to see a mini SNES over NES. I'm old so I remember having the NES but the SNES was my fav.

That I would actually consider. It would really come down to the game offered though. Thanks to early adopter WiiU status I got quite a few of the SNES titles I care about free or very cheap. Just this week I was able to finally get Super Mario RPG for $1.50.